Chapter 3: A Friend in the Fire

Chapter 3: A Friend in the Fire

The universe had contracted to the dimensions of a single dorm room. Brett was no longer a student, a son, or a friend. He was a keeper of secrets, a cartographer of a forgotten terror. He knelt on the floor, his fingers tracing the red yarn that connected Day 24 (Mud) to Day 65 (Static Face). The words from the letters had become his own internal monologue, the rules of the woods supplanting the rules of his own life. Don’t cry after dark. Don’t ask about the Watcher. Cover yourself in cold mud.

He was muttering the phrases under his breath when the world outside exploded back into existence.

CRACK!

The sound of splintering wood ripped through the quiet room. Brett jolted, his head snapping up. His dorm room door, the flimsy lock shattered, swung violently inward. Jameson stood framed in the doorway, his face a storm of fury, concern, and genuine fear.

“Jesus Christ, Brett!” Jameson’s voice was ragged. He took in the scene with wide, horrified eyes: the sprawling, insane map of letters and yarn, the empty coffee cups and pizza boxes, and Brett himself—gaunt, wild-eyed, looking like a wraith haunting the ruins of his own life. “What is happening to you?”

Brett scrambled to his feet, instinctively positioning himself between Jameson and the letters on the floor. A feral protectiveness surged through him. “You can’t just break down my door!”

“I’ve been calling for three days!” Jameson shouted, taking a step inside. The musty, earthen smell of the letters hit him, and he winced. “I’ve been banging on your door. I thought you were… I don’t know, dead or something. This is worse.” His eyes swept over the yarn-laced walls. “This is insane, man. You’ve gone insane.”

“No,” Brett said, his voice low and intense. “I’m finally seeing something real. Something that matters. You brought this to me, Jameson. You can’t just walk away from it.”

“Walk away? I want to run!” Jameson pointed a trembling finger at the pages. “Those things are poison. They’re just stories, Brett, sick, twisted stories from some messed-up kid, and they’re rotting your brain.”

“They’re not stories,” Brett hissed, the intellectual pride of his former self now a zealot’s conviction. “It’s a testimony. A warning. The details are too specific, the timeline is too consistent. He’s describing something that actually happened. A monster with a face like static, Mrs. Everly and her rituals… the dancing until their feet bled, Jameson, as a gift of pain!”

The raw horror of the words, spoken aloud, hung in the air. For a moment, Jameson looked shaken. But then he steeled himself, his fear hardening into resolve.

“My dad was right,” he said, his voice dropping to a grim whisper. “I never should have taken that box. He said to leave it, that some things are better left buried.”

He locked eyes with Brett, and in that moment, Brett saw his friend’s intention. It was a cold, dreadful certainty.

“We’re ending this,” Jameson declared. “Now.”

He lunged. Not at Brett, but at the original cardboard shoebox lying near the desk. Before Brett could react, Jameson had snatched it up.

“No!” Brett screamed, a raw, primal sound of loss.

“There’s a fire pit behind the commons,” Jameson said, his back to Brett as he headed for the shattered door. “We’re going to burn this curse. All of it.”

The thought of fire, of Danny’s words turning to ash and smoke, sent a spike of pure, unadulterated panic through Brett’s heart. These weren’t just letters. They were his purpose. They were the only thing that was real. Losing them would be like losing his own mind, his own soul. The world would go back to being boring and gray, but now he would be haunted by the knowledge of the vibrant, terrifying colors he had once seen.

He didn't think. He didn't weigh the consequences. He acted on an instinct that had been sharpened by days of paranoia and sleepless obsession. The Watcher doesn't like sound, but he is always hungry for things. Better to give him a little than for him to take a lot. The insane logic of the woods was now his own.

As Jameson stepped into the hallway, Brett launched himself forward. It wasn’t a push or a shove; it was a full-body tackle, a desperate, flying lunge fueled by a terror far deeper than anything he had ever known.

They crashed into the opposite wall of the narrow corridor with brutal force. The shoebox flew from Jameson’s grasp, hitting the floor and vomiting its remaining contents across the cheap carpet. A few yellowed envelopes skittered under a neighboring door.

Then came the sound.

It was a wet, sickening CRACK.

It wasn’t the sound of wood or cardboard. It was the sound of something vital giving way.

Jameson let out a choked, agonized scream that echoed down the hall. He collapsed, cradling his left arm to his chest. It was bent at an angle that was hideously, impossibly wrong, the bone visibly jutting against the skin of his forearm.

Time seemed to stutter. The world snapped back into focus for Brett with horrifying clarity. Doors creaked open down the hall as other students peeked out, their faces pale and questioning. He saw his friend—his best friend—writhing on the ground, his face a mask of shock and excruciating pain. He saw the betrayal in Jameson’s tear-filled eyes.

“Jameson…” Brett whispered, his voice trembling. “I… I didn’t mean to…”

Guilt, sharp and acidic, clawed at his throat. He should help him. He should call for an ambulance. He should be on his knees, apologizing, begging for forgiveness.

But his eyes were drawn downward, to the scattered letters on the floor. Danny’s life, his terror, his warnings, all lying there, vulnerable. He saw the page describing the mud ritual lying perilously close to a dirty sneaker print.

In that split second, two paths diverged in his soul. One led back to the light, to friendship and responsibility. The other led deeper into the woods.

He made his choice.

While Jameson groaned in pain and curious onlookers started to emerge from their rooms, Brett fell to his hands and knees. But he didn't move toward his friend. He scrambled across the floor, his hands like frantic spiders, gathering the precious, yellowed pages. He shoved them haphazardly into the broken box, his heart hammering a rhythm of pure, selfish panic.

“Brett…?” Jameson gasped, staring at him with dawning, heartbroken disbelief.

Brett ignored him. He scooped up the last of the envelopes, clutching the box to his chest like a lifeline. He gave his broken friend one last, horrified glance, the image of his pain searing itself into his memory.

Then he ran.

He bolted down the hallway, past the stunned faces of his dorm-mates, and burst through the stairwell door. He took the steps two at a time, his breath sobbing in his chest. He ran out of the building and into the cold night air, leaving his friend, his reputation, and the last remnants of his old life shattered on the hallway floor. He had chosen the mystery over the man, the whispers in the box over the friend in the fire. And it was a choice he could never, ever take back.